The Art of Living
by starspectrum
Summary: When someone's gone, it's a bit difficult to pick up the pieces. "Unfortunately, Sherlock Holmes had left a lot of pieces to be accounted for, and they weren't exactly easy to retrieve, as John Watson found out the hard way." Post-Reichenbach as told by our favorite Dr. Watson. Please R&R!


**Hey guys! This is my first story in the Sherlock fandom, so please read, and please tell me your thoughts afterwards! It would be much appreciated. :)**

**Enjoy!**

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

When someone has impacted your life so entirely that they weasel their way into your heart, it's a bit difficult to pick up the pieces when they're gone. Unfortunately, Sherlock Holmes had left a _lot_ of pieces to be accounted for, and they weren't exactly easy to retrieve, as John Watson found out the hard way.

To be completely honest, he wasn't quite sure how it happened. He'd been an army doctor in Afghanistan, and he'd seen all the blood and death and more blood and more death than he'd needed to see in a lifetime, and yet, somehow, he was convinced that seeing just a tad more wouldn't necessarily be bad. Well, he was wrong. John had seen death everyday when he was on duty, and seen death back home in England, and that was all fine and good. It was only when Sherlock was standing on top of a building, gazing steadily down at him, that he thought, _No, no, I can't handle any more death._

Clearly, although he'd thought that the war had hardened him over, that he could deal with anything life threw at him, he was most certainly not prepared for the shocking emptiness he was left to deal with. In fact, he was used to dealing with emptiness - you sort of had to be, being involved in a war, and then murder cases, and all. Impersonality, yeah? Don't attach yourself to the dying, because the dying tend to take a lot of you with them as they leave. John knew this - dammit, he _knew _this. So why couldn't he disassociate as his flatmate flung himself off the roof of St. Bart's, knowing that Sherlock would take many, many pieces of him?

He supposes that everyone is allowed to make a mistake once in a while. But this wasn't just a mistake. He had miscalculated the damage (John isn't very good at calculating the damage that one's flatmate can do once they jump off a building; after all, one typically doesn't have to deal with that kind of thing.)

No, John couldn't disassociate at all. In fact, his veins seemed to freeze from the inside-out, slowly spreading their chill throughout his entire body, rendering him shocked and unable to move in any way whatsoever. Sherlock's arms flailed as he fell, and John couldn't even blink, couldn't look away although he knew what was going to happen, didn't want to hear the crack of a skull against pavement, didn't want to make the connection that that was _Sherlock's _skull cracking against the sidewalk, and hell, why wasn't anyone doing anything? Why wasn't he moving? Why _couldn't _he move?

Time seemed to slow down. Slow. Everything was slow. And John knew what was going to happen. He knew, he knew, he knew. He knew, but he couldn't move. He knew that death was inevitable, that his world would crumble, that he himself would crumble, that maybe he wouldn't be able to find the pieces of the puzzle again for a long, long while. He knew all this but still _couldn't bloody move_.

And then it was over. And John shattered.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

The months had dragged by, slowly and predictably. John hadn't found the pieces, not really. He hadn't had time, didn't really want to think about it. Instead, he tried filling himself with new pieces, like different girls every week (that didn't last long, because either John felt bad for leading them on or he would wake up and wonder what the hell he was doing with his life, because John Watson was that kind of guy), and then his work, and then maybe a few too many pints at the pub (but that didn't last long either, because he was too afraid of alcoholism taking over.) So it always came back to immersing himself in his work, but Sarah tended to kick him out after twenty-four straight hours of it, claiming he needed his sleep.

But he didn't. Oh, God knows, he didn't. Because, see, John wasn't one of those lucky people who just didn't have dreams. He had loads every night, and they were always horribly vivid, and in the nine months since Sherlock's death, they revolved around the incident. Sometimes they simply replayed the memory of his fall and John's inability to do anything, and sometimes Sherlock would accuse John - "You had the chance to be a hero, John, the kind you say exist, so why didn't you _take _it?" - while other times, images of his friend's death would flash across the dark surface of his unconsciousness. He didn't think he could ever erase the sight of Sherlock's glazed eyes burned into his mind.

John would always wake up panting, drenched in sweat, eyes darting around his room until his brain caught up and assessed that no, Sherlock was not there, it had been months since he'd been in 221B Baker Street, and would never be there again. It was typically around three or four o'clock in the morning, and the flat was empty, so utterly _silent_ without the sound of a violin.

Some might think John stupid for staying in a place that could only do him harm, but what they didn't realize was that John _couldn't _leave. For now, at least. People underestimated him. Yes, he was broken, and sometimes a complete mess, but he was strong. He'd survived his time in Afghanistan, and that takes a certain kind of endurance, a kind that John had. And the primary thing keeping endurance burning is a tiny flicker of hope. What if Sherlock wasn't really dead? What if he came back?

Sherlock was unpredictable, so there was no sure way of knowing exactly where he would make his debut back into society, but if John had to take a guess, he guessed that he would one day show up at their flat, completely unannounced, and John would just walk in with his weekly groceries and end up dropping the milk in shock and then Sherlock would raise one eyebrow, and say, "John, you dropped your milk. I might suggest that you clean that up," and John would be unable to respond, and...and...

Even John Watson, a survivor of the war, could have only so much endurance. Eventually that hope, when reviewed, is believed to be foolish, and only that. Only a fool could think that a dead man could be raised. He refused to be a fool anymore, after nine months turned into a year.

God, there were so many damn pieces.

Mrs. Hudson would humor him when he would say that. (Even after a year, he still couldn't bring himself to move out ("Too much work," he'd tell people) and would still expect daily visits from the landlady.)

One time, he came back from a night out with Greg, after having downed maybe twice as much alcohol as he should have, but see, the conversation had taken a downward spiral as soon as Sherlock's name was brought up, and really, he wasn't going to turn into his sister and her alcoholism, so a few allowances should be able to be made, he figured, just for one night. Anyway, he'd come home, and he'd been sitting in his usual spot, hiccuping sadly at half past two in the morning, and then he got up, and apparently he had been making quite a bit of noise after he tried to microwave a bowl of cereal and he dropped it on the floor, pieces of ceramic flying everywhere.

There had been silence, as his hiccuping had stopped. He stood there for a solid ten minutes, eyes red and foggy, and he reckoned he would have stood there for the whole night, if Mrs. Hudson had not come up the stairs and opened the door.

"Oh, dear," she crooned, eyebrows furrowed. "What have you done now, hmm?"

"Uhm, well. I tried to heat up cereal. It was too cold. I'm cold," he attempted to explained, but his voice was slurred and he wasn't even really sure if his thoughts were translating correctly into words. He realized, somewhere in the back of his mind, that the hand that had grabbed the bowl had a slight burn, and maybe that was why he dropped the it, but to be honest, he hadn't really noticed that it had fallen until he'd heard the noise.

He giggled, his mind somewhere else. Things fell and shattered and people got hurt. Seemed to be a trend as of late.

Mrs. Hudson made a sympathetic noise in the back of her throat. She stood there for a moment, then straightened and grabbed his hands, gently pulling him away from the mess in the kitchen and back to his chair. He began to hiccup again, and he realized, with a frown, that Mrs. Hudson looked _awfully _sad.

As she turned and walked back towards the kitchen, the thought crossed his mind that maybe now would be a good time to say of few words to make her feel better. She seemed too tired and sad. "'S'okay," he said, a bit too loudly, forcing the corners of his mouth to twitch upward into a halfhearted smile, "there are lots of pieces that he took from everyone."

Mrs. Hudson stopped in her tracks. "What?"

Whoops. Must be the alcohol. John thought that he had been pretty explicit, but evidently, his mind and tongue weren't working together again. Translation from thoughts to words is always a tricky thing.

"He took lots of pieces," he repeated. "Sherlock," he added as an afterthought. Yes, now she might understand.

"Oh," she said. "Yes, I suppose you're right, dear." Her eyes were glistening when he squinted to see her. Greg did that too. John himself did that a lot, as well, whenever Sherlock's name was mentioned. God, he really had been bloody brilliant (he liked to tell people that frequently, so they didn't forget.) Except bloody brilliant consulting detectives didn't throw themselves off rooftops and hurt all of their friends. Hm. Problem.

Mrs. Hudson quietly cleaned up the mess, and by the time she was done, John had passed out in his chair, a slight gleam in the corner of his left eye. She sighed heavily, found a blanket to drape over him, and mournfully thought that Sherlock really had broken the man.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx  
**

John didn't really drink after that. Thankfully, Mrs. Hudson never mentioned that night, and frankly, John didn't know how he remembered the incident, and wished he didn't, so just shoved it to the back of his mind shack (his mind wasn't fancy enough to be a palace; in fact, Sherlock got offended when John once referred to his own mind as a palace. After that it was a shack, according to the detective.)

He still went out to the pub once a week with Greg, though. Every time he did, the other man would casually bring up a case - John had been a good partner to Sherlock, and everyone knew that. Just because he was dead didn't render John useless. But it seemed wrong. John wasn't nearly as observant, and he couldn't bear the weight of the dead anymore. When the topic of a case did come up, John would always cut the conversation short. "No more cases," he insisted. "I'm done with death." And this time, he meant it. John Watson could handle surgery, but that was all the farther his tolerance with ill people went. Death was a step too far.

Greg would always look at him with pity. He knew that John had pieces missing - hell, everyone did, and John was the most aware of anyone. Generally, Greg would shut up when he had breached a sensitive topic, like a case that John really wasn't interested in, or even the slip of Sherlock's name, because John was an ex-army man, and God forbid anyone incite his temper. But for some reason, on a particular Friday night, Greg wouldn't close his mouth.

"Look, mate, it's been a year. I know you think you're fine, but I think that you need to reconsider that. You look like you haven't slept in weeks and you're skinny as hell."

"Greg, not now." John gritted his teeth and clutched his glass tighter. He'd had a stressful day at work, and was even more stressed out because now he _didn't_ have work, and his thoughts were free to roam. His eyes fluttered shut. "Just..._not now_."

The other man huffed. "If not now, when, John? That's what you say every time I try to help you."

John let out a gust of air. He laughed faintly, and a slight ache pulsated outward from his chest. His mind was somewhat fuzzy from the alcohol - he wasn't drunk, no, he wouldn't let himself become so, but he was a bit more able to be swayed by his emotions than he would have been otherwise. "Help me?" he asked, quietly, his anger slowly building. "You're trying to _help_?"

"Yes."

He began speaking a little more loudly than he should have. "Hey, I'm fine. I've got a great job, a nice flat -"

"- which you still haven't moved out of, _come on _-"

John rubbed the bridge of his nose, attempting to keep his emotions in check. "- and plenty of mates to keep me content."

Greg looked skeptical. "What _mates_? Me, and who else?"

John froze. He goddamned froze like he froze when Sherlock was falling off a building. His breathing became shallow and he blinked several times. Greg brought up a good point. Yes, he sometimes went out for drinks with his coworkers, but did that really count? Their talk always revolved around work. Nowadays, that was all John could focus on. That was the only piece he had managed to fill back up - work. He was married to his work -

And that's when he just lost it.

To keep from crumbling altogether, he told himself that it was because of the war that John had been sucked into Sherlock's madness. John had been a weak, easily manipulated man, because he was already cracked at the edges, just shipped back to England, broken. Sherlock had repaired those cracks by inviting him to his world.

He had been bloody foolish to believe that he wouldn't be worse off if Sherlock ever left. However, when he _had _imagined them parting ways (just toying with the idea, of course), it hadn't been him watching Sherlock die of his own volition. That was never part of the equation, could never be, because that just wasn't the man he knew. Or thought he knew.

He had flat out refused to cry for an entire year. He wouldn't let himself. Sherlock was a passing phase of his life, or at least, that's what he kept repeating, for the sake of his sanity. But he knew, _he knew_, that that wasn't true.

So instead of facing the truth, he stood up, and walked out of the pub, leaving Greg in there, slightly confused and alone. He didn't follow John.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

There was a short phase - _very _short - in his life, perhaps only a handful of days, when John got very drunk. He'd done it when he first got back from the war and was miserably depressed, and he was doing it again now. Then, on the third day, he woke up, lying on his floor, and groaned, wondering what he was doing with his miserable excuse for a life.

He only drank with Greg on Friday nights after that.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx   
**

Ella, his therapist, suggested that he start the blog back up again. He disagreed. He had, over the course of time, figured how to filter his thoughts. Whenever ones that might upset him started to surface, he beat them back down, and focused on the "here" and the "now." He was _alive_, he argued. His blog had to do with dead people - let him focus on the living for once in his life.

"I don't know," she said carefully. "I think it would be good, actually. You've always had so many thoughts stored in that brain of yours, and you're a talented writer. It helped before, however stubborn you may be, however _reluctant_ you are to admit that, so I don't see why it shouldn't help again." She smiled as she was struck with an afterthought. "You find these sessions helpful?"

"Yeah."

"You'll keep coming back?"

"Yes, yes, of course. Why?"

"You can only come back if you've written an entry. Just _one_," she clarified as she saw the look of indignation spread across his face. "In fact, it doesn't even have to be on the blog. Just write something - in a journal, in the margins of a newspaper, on a small notepad - it doesn't matter. Just write, John, okay?"

John huffed, but stiffly nodded in acquiescence. "Fine. Just one," he repeated.

Later, in his flat, he decided to humor her, and wrote a short sentence on a post-it note. _I miss you_, it said, and he stuck it to the side of his refrigerator. He stepped back, tapping the pen against his chin, and narrowed his eyes in thought. He firmly clutched the notepad in his other hand. All was silent, before he took another step back, pulled the notepad close to his face, and began to scribble furiously.

A sentence for each note. His thoughts began to flow out, pen to paper, and refused to stop. He couldn't stop. There were too many thoughts, and too many emotions, and he wanted them outoutout so that he didn't get sick with it all in his head. Each time he finished a thought, he ripped the paper off the notepad and threw it to the floor, not caring where it fluttered. They were just more pieces, and at this point, he didn't care how much of himself he was bleeding out.

He finally stopped after who even _knows _how long, breathing heavily, realizing that his kitchen floor was now littered with an entire notepad's worth of paper. He surveyed the area around him, and without much thought, stepped out of the room, deciding he'd deal with it in the morning.

He was lonely, and he felt emptier than ever with all of his thoughts out of him. His mind was silent and it was, frankly, unnerving. He spared a glance at the kitchen floor once more, then trotted back to his bedroom and fell into bed, ignoring the rapidly rising lump in his throat.

Bloody therapist.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

At this point, a good year and a half since the famous fall, he had come to terms with Sherlock's death (at least, that's what he told himself.) He got a different flat, finally, though entirely on his own, because, well, having another flatmate was just more than he could handle at the moment. He still visited Mrs. Hudson and Greg and even said the irregular hello to Molly, but he didn't think, after he had moved out, that he could revisit 221B Baker Street, although Mrs. Hudson swore she would never rent it to anyone else, just in case he decided to come back.

He knew he wouldn't. He could never. Because in that flat, it was so utterly empty and cold and..._empty_. John was empty enough already, though he'd never admit that, to _anyone_. In fact, he carried on with his life as though nothing had changed, as though he hadn't completely relocated to a different part of London, as though he hadn't started a job at a different hospital, as though he wasn't completely broken.

Except there really was no denying that last fact. See, every day, after work, John would stroll into his apartment, slump down into a chair (there was only one in the living room, now), and read. Then he would make supper. Then, maybe, he would watch television until colors and words started to blur together, and then, _but only then_, would he retire to his bedroom, and hope to fall asleep without choking on the gigantic lump in his throat. When it was really bad, just before he lost consciousness, he would think that maybe choking wouldn't be so bad, because God, sometimes, the burning ache he felt just wouldn't go away.

Yes, there were many pieces, too many to find, and too many to pick up, and too many to put back into place. There was no returning to the old John Watson.

Oh, he tried. He spoke with Ella for months until realizing that talking about his brokenness (all thanks to Sherlock) really wasn't helping matters, and he threw himself into his work, until he realized that that wasn't helping either, just staving off the flood of emotions until he suffocated from them all at night. He tried to be social (he couldn't, not very well, unfortunately.) He tried in so many ways, none of which worked, because Sherlock bloody Holmes had broken him. However, exactly a year and a half after the fall, he came to accept that fact.

As a surgeon, he knew what people could and could not survive. He knew he could survive this. Yes, it would be difficult, extremely so. But he had survived one war; therefore, he could survive another. In fact, in no way was this _not_ a war. Even waking up in the morning was a battle to be won, because the first thing John noticed when he woke up was the emptiness, and that's a very difficult fight to be fought-beating back that emptiness.

But he won every day. John Watson always had been a fighter.

_Except when you did nothing_, that voice in the back of his head said. _Never mind winning - you couldn't even fight_.

He ignored, albeit not without difficulty, that voice.

So John tried to live his life to the best of his ability. He had a routine down. Work, work, work, all through the week. Try to eat and sleep somewhere in there. Get groceries on Thursdays. Go out for drinks with Greg on Fridays. Visit Mrs. Hudson on Monday evenings. He was pretty damn good at this routine, too, actually. He was, in an odd way, proud of himself. He'd managed to right himself in some way, even if he just managed to get himself back to normal.

Well, one Thursday, that illusion of normalcy crashed and burned. (But really, he shouldn't have been surprised.)

He'd just gotten back from grocery shopping, after a long day of work, and he was absolutely exhausted. He'd been on call the night before, and hadn't been able to come home after that to get some sleep. In fact, things in his line of vision started to blur together, so he considered breaking his routine and, after unloading the groceries, going straight to bed. He unlocked the door, swung it open, and walked directly to the kitchen.

He could barely focus on his task at hand. His movements, clumsy from fatigue, made loud noises that echoed in the empty flat. His heart shuddered as he absentmindedly thought about how lonely he was. Perhaps he would meet Greg just a bit earlier for drinks the following night, just to have more _actual _human contact.

John began to place the colder items in the refrigerator, and just by pure chance, he happened to straighten up and look behind his shoulder, because, was he simply tired, or had he heard a slight crinkle of...paper?

Yes, yes, it had been paper. Normally, John would have jumped into action, but because of his utter fatigue, he was a bit mellower today. He calmly noticed man was sitting in his chair in the living room, his face obscured by the newspaper - he was very calm, until it hit him. And oh, it hit him hard. He would know that man from anywhere. Dark suit, mop of curly hair, nimble fingers, and...that was about when John dropped the carton of milk.

John didn't even realize that it had fallen from his hand and was quickly making a mess, because all he could focus on was the man as he slowly lowered the newspaper, revealing the face that he _knew_ was there, but couldn't quite manage to believe was. The high cheekbones, the piercing eyes, pale complexion... He felt a bit faint. The thought of throwing up crossing his mind, but he somehow managed to repress that urge, although the nausea was still there.

Sherlock Holmes hadn't changed one bit.

His right eyebrow raised gracefully and a smirk found its way to his lips. "John, you dropped your milk. I might suggest that you clean that up," he said, in his usual baritone voice. Once again, John couldn't move, except this time it was not necessarily that he couldn't, it was that he couldn't be bothered. Bloody _hell_, it was like he never even left. Had he? In all this time, had John really been so broken? Had he really been so empty, so lonely, so hopeless? Had pieces of himself really been missing? Because right now, in this moment, it seemed kind of trivial, in a way. Odd, as just moments before, he had been living with a dull sort of hurt in his chest, but it appeared to have, well, disappeared.

For the first time in months, John Watson let a genuine smile spread across his face. He would deal with explanations and apologies and arguments and talking later. For now, he just let himself look into the other man's face, sigh a breath of relief as a huge weight was lifted, and slowly blink. The room was warmer and he didn't feel so hollow, not in this moment.

Without even trying, he let the pieces fall into place.

**xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx**

**Well? Thoughts? Please review, and thanks for reading!**


End file.
